DaytonDailyNews.com

CLEARWATER, Fla. — If you see a lot of Pete Rose in Jonny Gomes, well, it's there and easy to see.

It was after the 2005 season, after Gomes finished third in the American League Rookie of the Year voting.

Gomes was in Las Vegas and saw Rose signing autographs in a memorabilia store.

"I was just a pup, but I bought a picture and stood in line to get it signed by Pete," Gomes said. "When I got to the table, I introduced myself and Pete said, 'I know you. I like the way you play, kid. Just like me.' "

To Gomes, that was the voice of a baseball god and the words stuck.

"Writers already were throwing around things, not numbers, comparing me to Rose — my approach to the game, my aggressive slides, my aggressive play and my attitude," Gomes said Monday, March 9, before the Cincinnati Reds hit four homers and beat the Philadelphia Phillies 8-4 (Chris Valaika hit the team's fifth grand slam this spring, while Ryan Hanigan, Yonder Alonso and Daryle Ward also homered).

Gomes was 0-for-3 Monday but is hitting .353 with two doubles and two home runs in 17 at-bats.

Gomes said Rose had him sit down at the autograph table, "And we had a 15-minute conversation and the line got longer and longer and people were getting mad. But Pete was great. We talked shop and talked about hitting."

Rose signed a game jersey for Gomes and posed with him for a picture that he also signed.

In addition to his physical talent, it is his Pete Rose-type personality the Reds would like to add to their mix, a guy with a clubhouse presence.

All he has to do is make the team.

"I'm too young to have remembered Rose playing, a little before my time, but listening to him was like I was a kid in a candy store listening to all his stories," Gomes said.

"When I was coming up, it was when all this blackball stuff started against him, but now that I know the inside and out of his career I'm a big fan of Pete Rose," Gomes added.

"You want a player like him on your team — a guy who will get on base and score a run in any way. He set the tempo as a team player."

There is a reason Gomes plays full-bore 24/7. After playing in a championship game for Casa Grande High School near San Francisco, he and his best friend, Adam Paul Westcott, were on their way home when their car struck a utility pole.

Westcott died and Gomes wears his name on a biceps tattoo and said, "It was like a little bird was saying, 'You never know when you'll play your last game,' and my friend went 0-for-4 and maybe he didn't run hard on every play and I always think, 'If he had known it was the last game he would ever play, would he have played harder?' I don't want anybody ever asking that question about me."